


dead fish

by Arlene0401



Series: Tumblr drabbles and oneshots 2018 [2]
Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Blood and Gore, Canon Universe, Complicated Relationships, F/M, Hate Sex, Love/Hate, Murder, Originally Posted on Tumblr, Revenge, Tumblr Prompt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-18
Updated: 2018-06-18
Packaged: 2019-05-24 21:35:08
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,657
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14962620
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Arlene0401/pseuds/Arlene0401
Summary: Yelena iscold. Her eyes are a gorgeous shade of dark brown, striking in someone with such light hair and pale skin, and they seem made for gazes full of warmth and kindness. In another life, Levi might want to drown in those eyes, watch every minute emotion flicker through them and never get tired.





	dead fish

**Author's Note:**

> Requested by anon on tumblr with the prompt: "Good girl."  
> Heads up to my regular readers: this is _nothing_ like my usual writing. For some reason when I read the prompt, the fic’s finale popped up in my head and everything kind of unraveled backwards from there.  
>  Over the last months I have suffered several losses, losses that not only left empty spaces in my life but open wounds and unanswered questions, and I condensed some of my grief and conflict into this.

“Okay, this might sting a little…”, Levi says and applies the disinfectant. His mare flinches but otherwise stands obediently still.

The wound on her right foreleg is only superficial, and Levi is quickly done with cleaning and bandaging it.

“There you are. Good girl. Now don’t go jumping any more fences, will you? I know life has become rather boring for you.” He feeds her a piece of carrot and pats her neck, and she happily nuzzles his hair.

“Now wouldn’t I wish that were me,” Levi hears a voice behind him, and he turns around to see Yelena leaning against the stable wall. She ambles closer, and the mare snorts, nervously flicking her ears.

“You seem very fond of this… outdated means of transportation,” she continues, and in this moment Levi hates her arrogant tone even more than usual. “What even makes her a ‘good girl’?”

“She trusts me,” Levi says simply. “She trusts me so much that she even lets me do hurtful things because she knows I only have the best intentions. Any horse could break a man’s neck in a second, yet she chooses not to.” He has intended to stay here a moment longer, but the mood is ruined. In irritation, he picks up his utensils, leaves the stall and closes the door, ignoring the soft whinnying.

He walks to the storeroom to put the bottle of disinfectant, bandages and scissors away, and when he turns to leave he finds Yelena blocking the way.

“What would it take me to be a good girl, then? Should I let you hurt me too?”

Levi crosses his arms. “Wouldn’t have gauged you as one who likes to be slapped around. Rather the opposite, I figured.”

“Oh, I’m fine with both,” she breathes and steps closer, and he becomes aware again of how fucking tall she is. Everything about Yelena is larger than it’s supposed to be, but that isn’t what puts him off. Levi has a thing for tall people, after all. But something about her is… off, and he can’t really put his finger on it. She seems to view the whole world around her with disdain and boredom, as if nothing could ever impress or surprise her. He studies her face as she invades his personal space, this face that is so beautiful and so bare of expression, the eyes that are so large and dark and… cold.

That’s it. Yelena is _cold_. Her eyes are a gorgeous shade of dark brown, striking in someone with such light hair and pale skin, and they seem made for gazes full of warmth and kindness. In another life, Levi might want to drown in those eyes, watch every minute emotion flicker through them and never get tired.

Instead, they regard the world as if they have seen it a hundred times over. The only times she isn’t wearing a mask of contempt, the only times her features are alight with childlike wonder and joy, is when she is around - or talks about - Zeke.

Levi’s stomach churns. He steps back and tries to get around her, but she only crosses his path again, crowds him back against the wall. He can feel her breath on his face.

Then she has closed the distance and is kissing him, not light and gentle but hard and with a hint of desperation. He pushes her away.

“I’m not interested in fucking a dead fish. That’s what you are. Cold and dead like that slimy disgusting seafood you enjoy so much.” The words are out before he can stop them, and part of him relishes in their cruelness.

But Yelena only smiles and rips her uniform shirt open, the buttons popping and flying everywhere. Underneath, she is bare, and her breasts look surprisingly soft for someone as unyielding as she is. “Dead fish, huh?” she mocks and guides Levi’s unresisting hand to cup one of her breasts.

**********

The sex is never gentle. It is violent and ugly, hard thrusts and heavy grunts, leaving them both black and blue. He doesn’t know why she keeps coming to him when all he does is take her and then leave, not caring if she’d come or helping her clean up the mess he’d made of her. He doesn’t know why he keeps fucking her when she is still cold, so fucking cold it feels like touching burning ice. The only thing he knows is that he never ever brings an expression to her eyes. Never once does she look at him as if she cares. Never once does she look at him with scorn, or sorrow, or softness. Her eyes remain inscrutable pits of emptiness, and sometimes he finds himself itching to reach for his knife to wipe that empty mask off her, to make her react with something, anything.

**********

She has his arms pinned to the bed and rides him with abandon, chases her own pleasure with dark determination. Her sweat drips down on him, and he hates the cold droplets crawling over his skin. Her eyes are on his face, but she doesn’t see him.

“Why me?” he asks. “Why me when you have Zeke?”

“It’s not like this. He’s not like you. Stop comparing things that aren’t comparable.”

“Oh yeah, he’s a god, I forgot.” With a quick movement that takes her by surprise he rolls over and effectively knocks her off. “But I’ll tell you what. When all this shit is over I will kill him, and no one is going to stop me from doing so. And then you’ll see that your god is only meat and bowels and a fuckload of blood.”

“Why? Why do you still insist on killing him?”

“I made a promise. And I keep my promises.” He runs a palm through his hair. “Now get the fuck out of here. I’m tired.”

**********  
She prods the bruises his fingers left on her throat thoughtfully. Everybody will see them, but Levi can’t bring himself to care. He’s pretty sure they know anyway. He’s seen Eren eyeing him cautiously, sometimes opening his mouth as if to say something, but he never does. Mikasa has started to regard him with a mix of concern and confusion. They sense that Levi and Yelena are caught up in some vicious and self destructive cycle, and he feels them wanting to understand.

He’s glad they never bring it up. He doesn’t understand it either.

“Say it.”

“What?”

“Say I’m your good girl.”

His eyes flick over to her and away again.

“You’re not a good girl, and least of all mine.”

“But I let you hurt me.”

“Are you seriously comparing yourself to my horse? That’s fucked up, even for you, Yelena. Don’t make this about one of your sick kinks.”

She says nothing.

“She’s my life insurance, my comrade and best friend. She’s carried me right into hell and back again countless times, in this neverending nightmare that was our lives. She knew I would do everything to bring her back home every time. Every time she was injured, every time I had to treat her roughly, drive her past the point of exhaustion, fix her wounds, I could see it in her eyes. There was pain and fear in them, but most of all she recognized me as the one she could rely on. There was trust. There was caring. _You_ don’t care for me. I’m nothing to you, and you’re nothing to me. You only look at me with those dead eyes of yours. The same look you had on your face when you executed your superior. There’s nothing there, Yelena. Nothing.”

**********

With a last satisfying scrunch Levi drives his blade through Zeke’s skull. The smoke of the beast titan’s carcass whirls around him, but he’s unaware of the stench of dissolving flesh. Standing in the indistinguishable mass of gore and splintered bones that used to be Zeke Jaeger, Levi waits for a rush of triumph that doesn’t come.

He has expected to feel exhilarated or relieved, to have a feeling of completion or closure. Instead, his head is an empty hull. He could just as well be one of the Marley’s war machines, coming to a standstill after having fulfilled its mission. Static noise crackles through his nerves, and the coppery stench fills him with light nausea.

A bluebottle alights on one of Zeke’s hands that juts out from the steaming pile. That’s gods for you. At the end of the day, maggot fodder like all of us.

He feels the bullet pierce his chest before he hears the shot and looks down to see red spread on his shirt. Quickly so.

He’s not surprised.

Cocks his head up again to face Yelena stalking closer, gun trained on him, but her hand is shaking.

He watches her, and suddenly the angle shifts as his knees give in. Blood rises in his throat, and he coughs it up. The cough turns into a chuckle as his vision is taken up by the barrel of her gun.

“You’ll want to make this more personal, Yelena. Here.” He tosses his sword down at her feet.

“Anybody can shoot a rabid dog, but taking someone down with a blade is something different entirely.”

She contemplates the jarred blade for a while, lost in thought. Then she throws her gun away and picks it up, thumb caressing the worn out handle. Her eyes never leave his face.

Eyes that are large and a gorgeous shade of deep brown. In another lifetime, Levi may want to drown in them.

He waits for it with baited breath until he sees it.

An emotion flickering through her eyes. He cannot read it, but it doesn’t matter. Sorrow, hatred, grief, rage, trust. It doesn’t matter. She acknowledges Levi, and there is something in her. _Something_. It’s enough, at least to Levi.

“Good girl.”

Yelena raises the sword, a single tear trailing down her face.


End file.
